Summary: | For many Westerners, ours seems to be the era of the "Islamic threat," with radical Muslims everywhere on the rise and on the march, remaking societies and altering the landscape of contemporary politics. In a powerful corrective to this view, the French political philosopher Olivier Roy presents an entirely different verdict: political Islam is a failure. Even if Islamic fundamentalists take power in countries like Algeria, they will be unable to reshape economics and politics and, in the name of "Islamic universalism," will express no more than nationalism or an even narrower agenda. Despite all the rhetoric about an "Islamic way," an "Islamic economy," and an "Islamic state," the realities of the Muslim world remain essentially unchanged.--Publisher description.
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